Posted on 01/21/2007 6:25:42 PM PST by Dallas59
Police Warn Residents To Keep Children And Pets Indoors Image
Hazel Sanchez Reporting
NORWOOD, N.J. A pack of wild coyotes on the loose in a New Jersey town has police on alert and residents staying indoors. The Norwood Police Department has issued a reverse 911 call to residents to warn them of the danger.
Norwood resident Liz Murray tells CBS 2 her children were playing outside when she noticed the animals on the prowl. "The kids were in the backyard a few days ago, and I was sitting on the deck watching them and there were three coyotes watching my kids," she said.
Murray says she's afraid to leave her children outside alone now for fear the coyotes could attack. Investigators believe the animals live in a wooded area just beyond the Murray's playground and say there may be as many as seven of them.
One of Murray's children, Joseph, says he can hear the coyotes howling at night. "Sometimes it's like they're in our backyard, but sometimes it feels like they're a mile away," he said. "It feels sort of scary."
Police say the coyotes recently killed an 8-month-old bichon frise that lived a few houses away from the Murray's. They're now telling residents to keep their children and their pets indoors.
"They seem to be getting more aggressive as our deer population and our coyote population are growing. This is actually the first sign of aggression we've seen in regards to the coyotes, so hopefully we can get some help by the state and county to control it," Norwood Mayor James Barsa says.
Police now plan to increase patrols in the neighborhood and say they'll issue more reverse 911 calls to residents to spread the warning.
For now, Liz Murray admits she's living with a bit of fear.
"It's frightening in that we shouldn't have to worry about the safety of our children in our own backyard," she says. "It should not be, so hopefully something will be done about it."
Yea, it wasn't until I pressed post that I thought better of it.
The Eastern "Coyote" isn't the same critter as the western coyote. Its MUCH larger and hunts in packs. They are believed to have evolved from western coyotes which hybridized with eastern wolves in Canada and then moved south into the deer ridden forests of the northeast to fill the "ecological niche" of the timber wolf.
Here in Northern Mississippi we shoot them on sight. Outdoor cats and dogs that weigh less than 20# are coyote bait. My score for this last summer was Coyotes 1, Vetvetdoug 6. After they got my house cat I started using my .308 to get their attention.
Ironically, I was reading a letter to the editor in the "Nashville Tennessean" today, from a guy mad that a town near Nashville's police officers were going to trap some 'yotes and move (or kill) them. He was trying to say, in his letter, that coyotes are beneficial to the ecosystem. So dumb he didn't realize coyotes are not native to this area and "ecosystem."
Middle Tennessee has had a lot of problems from coyotes, several pets being eaten, etc.
I think we ought to trap those excess 'yotes in middle Tennesse and make that idiot pen them in his yard (grin).
Keep the male coyotes away from Breederville. They are particularly fond of female Golden Retreivers.
Well, maybe if you bag enough of them!!!
Actually, we have two American Indian Dog breeders. They have coyote in them.
I have friends who live in North Jersey and the BEARS(!) are becoming a problem.
Thanks for the info.
Good Hunting... from Varmint Al
Not sure of your meaning/intent. Should that "doggy bone" have a skull and crossbones on it?
Reverse 911 calls to warn people about coyotes? ROTFLMAO!!
Just tell the people to keep their pets locked up for a time and trap the bastards. Coyotes are not hard to trap. That's right, good old leg hold traps, tried and true.
NO joke, my cousin has a farm and he was clearing some land to plant some more blueberry's, and he dug up a passel of rattlers. Somehow word got out and the state came in and told him he could not destroy their habitat.
The demand for hides will be so great that we'll clean the varmints out for decades.
don't ya know that only dumb southern rednecks actually hunt animals...and enjoy it.
Strychnine biscuit?
.........uh, if it bleeds, you can kill it. maybe a .224 or .225, whatever it takes.../sarc
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